Teaching Science: 13 yr old vs. Graduate

[EdEarl]

I do not like this Topic Title because it is inaccurate; whereas, and my experience as a programmer has taught precision is crucial. But, after considering the purpose of a title, and wrestling with my language limitations (I am far from being a poet), I decided to use it, because a title needs to engage an audience, as science education for 13 year old brains need to engage its intended audience and must sometimes sacrifice accuracy to do so. See this video:

 

Edited May 28, 2013 by EdEarl

[ajb]

I decided to use it, because a title needs to engage an audience, as science education for 13 year old brains need to engage its intended audience and must sometimes sacrifice accuracy to do so.

This applies to well beyond 13 year olds. One will often have to skips some details at research seminars in order to get the overall message across and still keep your audience engauged. To many seminars that I have attended try to tell us too much and with too much detail. Edited May 28, 2013 by ajb

[CaptainPanic]

I totally agree with this presentation (and with ajb's reply).

 

Many scientists do not know who is their audience (or the level of their audience), and they also have no thought about the message that they want to get across. Generally, they estimate that the audience knows as much about the topic as themselves (hint: wrong) and they want to communicate far too much information.

 

I have to say though that in high school, my textbooks were of acceptable difficulty. I could read them, and understand it. At university however, the desire for compete scientific accuracy lead to texts as in the movie: a huge mix of difficult words that you have to read three times to understand. Not very inviting.

 

I usually suffer from instantaneous sleepiness when I have to read such texts. I really start yawning, and I lose focus really fast.

[Ophiolite]

If scientists were rigorously trained on the writing of excellent abstracts then science would advance 23% faster than it does at present. (A citation will be available as soon as I've written the paper.)

[Ringer]

If scientists were rigorously trained on the writing of excellent abstracts then science would advance 23% faster than it does at present. (A citation will be available as soon as I've written the paper.)

They way I usually read scientific papers in order:

 

Plenty of time

Abstract --> skim introduction --> Discussion <-back and forth to make sure discussion is accurate-> Results -if something seems off-> Methods

 

Not a lot of time

Abstract --> Skim introduction --> Skim discussion

[CharonY]

Peer-Reviewing paper:

Read Abstract -> get interested -> read intro -> shake head in disbelief due to lack in background knowledge-> make coffee -> read discussion -> scratch head in confusion -> check methods ->laugh hard and spill coffee over paper -> read results to pinpoint what went wrong -> write scathing review.

[CharonY]

Giving a decent lecture requires to know the audience. Obviously if talking to laymen you would try to convey it in a very simplified way and relate via examples that the audience may be familiar with. Obviously the same would be frowned upon if delivering to an expert panel.

In most cases it is a bit better to deliver more on the simplified side as chances are higher that people are not familiar with the specifics of your work. The trick here is to figure out what the core message of your talk is and focus to highlight that rather than getting lost in data, or showing all the work that has been done (this is especially relevant for students) etc.

 

The very same applies to writing a compelling abstract.